After lunch had ended and everyone filed out of the cafeteria, Miss Kaylee took Kenny for a walk around the school campus. The grounds were full of activity, for a free period was in progress. The afternoon's light warmed Kenny in her thin fall coat. Voices and laughter ricocheted off the smooth buildings that made up AGC, and Kenny felt as if thousands of people were surrounding her rather than just the few loud students that passed the two on their leisurely stroll.

Miss Kaylee was the first to speak. "I see you've made a few friends. Color, Fins, and Clay, yes?"

Kenny nodded in response. She took her index cards out to use them to communicate further with Miss Kaylee. The woman seemed to pause for a moment, but soon went on.

"So you know what Gifted means now? In the Academy of Gifted Children," Miss Kaylee added, just to clarify.

Kind of. Kenny pulled another card out of the stack. It's kind of confusing.

"What? The definition of Gifted or the Gifts themselves?"

Kenny already had the next card prepared. Both.

Miss Kaylee chuckled. "Don't worry. I'll explain everything tomorrow."

Why tomorrow? Kenny wondered, frustrated. Why not now? But she stayed quiet and kept walking.

Kenny followed Miss Kaylee to a building that sat next to the Main Office. Groups of girls milled around the large brick structure, sitting in the grass, squealing at each other's jokes, whispering about other girls behind their backs. A plaque next to the door told Kenny it was the Girls' Dormitories. Miss Kaylee put her ID card up to a black scanner underneath the plaque, and the door opened.

Inside the Dormitories were long carpeted hallways and white walls that seemed to stretch on endlessly. Only a few inconsistently spaced blue doors and paintings interrupted the bleakness. Potted flowers occasionally showed up throughout the hallway, using their colors to adorn the dormitory. Kenny noticed a few of the pots were filled with soil, but no flowers. She watched as a girl proceeded to put her hand in a small pot and scrunch her face up in concentration. A single white rose protruded from the dark earth underneath the girl's fingers.

Kenny audibly gasped.

"The roses are beautiful, Flower!" Miss Kaylee grinned at a girl as they walked past her. The girl smiled back smugly and replied, "I know!" She began to grow more flowers with nothing but her palm. Kenny had a hard time pulling her gaze away from the legerdemain.

"Come, Kendall! You're room's over here."

Kenny hurried to Miss Kaylee's side as the woman walked up to a door and swiped her card on the scanner to open it. The digits ND19 were in gold lettering on the blue plywood. What does ND stand for? Kenny speculated as she picked up one of her suitcases to bring it inside the room. She had enough questions to fill a whole notebook, and she was considering dedicating a pack of index cards solely to the unanswered queries.

"You'll only stay here for a day or two," Miss Kaylee explained as she pushed the door open, "so I apologize if the room is kind of small."

Kenny looked around her living space in wonder. A twin bed sat in the corner covered in blue and white—the school colors, Kenny realized—sheets. Next to the bed sat a small wooden bookshelf with a navy blue backpack leaned up against it. The letters AGC were embroidered on the front pouch, and the bag was full of books and files. Miss Kaylee promptly picked up the backpack upon entry.

"Sorry about that! Just school files and papers that I need to review...," Miss Kayee trailed off when she realized Kenny wasn't listening to her. The young girl's attention was focused on something else.

Kenny stared at a glass desk sat in the corner of the room with a round keyboard laying on it. A personal hologram computer (PHC) hummed underneath the desk, awakening when it felt someone's presence in the room. Several beams of light shot out of the PHC and through the glass to form the words HELLO. I AM ORION.

Kenny nearly dropped her suitcase at the sight of it all.

"Have you ever used a PHC before?" Miss Kaylee asked, noticing the girl's awe.

Kenny shook her head and put her bag down next to the bed. She remembered reading about personal hologram computers when she was younger, but she had never seen a tangible PHC. There was a short paragraph from an encyclopedia article she could recall word for word: PHCs are scarce in the United States, and the cheapest one so far, Trojan by Renecesere Corporation, costs about $100,000. These computers are proficient at displaying 3D animations and drawings. Because of their nearly impenetrable firewalls and detailed map graphics, PHCs are used as security mainframes in central intelligence units around the world.

"This is an experimental model," Miss Kaylee informed the young girl as she inspected the machine. "Recensere plans on releasing it internationally in a few months, and they'll only cost about thousand dollars each. They wanted to make PHCs easy to use and afford."

The light beams changed their shape to create another phrase. PLEASE LOG IN.

Kenny hurried to find an index card that would make sense of what she wanted to say. She settled on, How do you do that?

"What? Log in?" Miss Kaylee paused, hesitant about her next words. "Orion possesses voice recognition software. You say your name several times, and it uses it to understand your vocal patterns. Once you do that, it'll automatically log you in any time you speak near it."

PLEASE LOG IN. The words which once excited the young girl seemed to mock Kenny now. She stood silently by Orion for a moment before walking off to bring more of her bags into the room. Miss Kaylee went with her, only a few seconds behind.

Miss Kaylee was silent for a few minutes after the exchange. However, the woman seemed to be contemplating something, a question perhaps. Kenny's suitcases were quickly put away, though, and Miss Kaylee soon had no reason to stay in the room. Before she left, Miss Kaylee finally spoke, asking Kenny a question that surprised the young girl with its suddenness.

"Kenny, why don't you talk?"

Kenny stared at the woman for a second, no a millisecond— a period so short Miss Kaylee barely noticed the pause. However, the brief hiatus was there, and in those few second Kenny paused for, she thought about everything she knew about Miss Kaylee. It was simple to figure out that what Miss Kaylee wanted was a quarter truth; she wanted to hear something that was a small factor in Kenny's muteness, but not nearly the reason why she kept her mouth closed everyday.

So that's what Kenny gave her as she lifted up an index card that said, I don't like the way my voice sounds.

Miss Kaylee gave Kenny a small, sad smile. "Oh. I'm sorry."

The woman then awkwardly left the room, allotting Kenny time to make up for sleep that had been lost that morning or read another book. However, Kenny's gaze fell back to Orion. The words PLEASE LOG IN seemed to widen, and Kenny took an involuntary step towards the machine. Curiosity filled her very bones, and the young girl decided to satisfy it. Because, though it is dangerous, knowledge cannot come without inquisitiveness.

Kenny sat in the swivel chair at the desk, and the light beams bended to form another sentence. PLEASE SAY YOUR FULL NAME, Orion commanded.

Kenny took a deep breath. "K-Kendall Annabeth Frodell," she stuttered hurriedly. She repeated her name a few more times in a slightly different tone each time, and Orion recorded her voice silently. Finally, the light beams moved and created a different phrase.

THANK YOU, Orion said. The beams changed again. YOU ARE NOW LOGGED IN. WELCOME, KENDALL.

Kenny's heart pounded in her chest, and she felt like she had done something she shouldn't have. She logged off and quickly moved away from the desk to distance herself from Orion. After a moment of staring wearily at the PHC, the young girl decided it was time for her to get some rest. I'll just have a quick nap, she told herself as she rubbed her eyes, so there's no point in changing my clothes. Kenny lay on the bed, glancing at Orion every few minutes, and fell into a short slumber.

Well, it seemed short.

The young girl felt as if she had only closed her eyes for five seconds when she was awoken by a loud knock. She pulled the warm covers off of her and shuffled to the door in a daze. Miss Kaylee's smiling face was the first thing she saw when she looked up. Kenny blinked the blurriness from her eyes as the woman greeted her.

"Hello, Kendall! I apologize for waking you but we must hurry if we are to make it to the radiologist's office before breakfast."

Kenny fumbled with her cards, taking a moment to find the right one. What time is it?

"Five thirty in the morning," Miss Kaylee informed the young girl. "I'm afraid you slept through dinner and there's no time to eat anything now. Dr. Kane only sees Gifted patients from six to eight so, as I said before, we must hurry. The showers are down the hall to the right. We've only got half an hour."

Why are we going? Kenny showed her card to Miss Kaylee. She had forgotten what Color and Fins had told her the day before.

Miss Kaylee answered the question quickly, checking her watch as she did. "To the radiologist? Because you need to get an MRI. When we're done, I'll answer all of your questions about AGC and Gifted people. I'll tell you everything, Kendall."  

A/N: Hey there, readers! This is just one of about six or seven reminders in this ENTIRE book to tell you to press that yellow star on the top right corner of your screen. Voting is insanely important for writers on Wattpad. It may not seem like it, but by just tapping your screen once each time you finish a chapter, you can boost a writer like me from #1000 in science fiction to #130. It's crazy! Adding the story to your reading lists or libraries barely has half of this power! So please, remember to vote! Happy reading!